Boots plotting his next move

So near and yet so far

Pic of the day

Christmas memories

When I was a child my mother owned a millinery shop. She had learned millinery as a trade in Ireland and continued to work at it after she emigrated to Canada in 1930 to marry my father who had arrived in 1928. After my parents moved from Toronto in 1942 she went into business for herself. In those days, women always wore hats; they didn't need a special occasion. While my mother had her own designs that sold well, her customers would often bring her photos from fashion magazines and ask her to create something similar. Some women came from Toronto to buy. She was good, very good.

We lived behind the shop on the main street just on the edge of downtown. By today's standards the entire place was small; probably no more than 20 feet wide by 40 deep including the shop. One storey, no basement, no front yard and a postage stamp of a grassless rear yard. My bedroom was an alcove off my parents'. But when you're five you don't notice these things.

I was always around the shop. At first I would sit in my high chair in the workroom where my mom could keep an eye on me. When I was older she would give me scraps of material and I would make "hats". I was later told I always said they were for Aunt Martha, my mother's aunt. No one had any idea why. I was lucky. Although my mother worked at a time when few married women did, she was always home.

The shop, although small, was a place of wonderment. Drawers filled with hats and their makings. Feathers, beads, boas, artificial fruit, buttons, sequins, fur. Wooden heads that served both to display the hats and to block them (set their shape) when being made stood on shelves and counters. And always people to fuss over me.

Christmas was special. Like Easter, the run up was my mother's busiest period. She often worked 14 hour days, either serving customers or making hats, to meet the demand, easing off the week before. But she always decorated. There were lights around the door and front window. The window display was stripped of hats to become a winter wonderland. Houses with lights inside, papier-mâché figures, Santa in a sleigh, reindeer dotted throughout, little artificial Christmas trees, a mirror laid flat as a skating pond. And all the empty space was filled with cotton batting snow, drifting from between the houses, softening the edges of the pond, fluffed and tufted, sparkling with sequin ice.

I suppose if I were to see it now I wouldn't be all that impressed, but my Ghost of Christmas Past always lets me use rose-coloured glasses.

Christmas past

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A soldier carrying a Christmas tree, 1915

A woman returns home from the market with a Christmas tree, 1895

A Christmas tree in an Edwardian parlour, 1905

A young sailor buys a Christmas tree at a greengrocer's and a young boy
waits in a queue of children to buy some mistletoe, 1918

Source: Vintagephoto on Livejournal

Pic of the day

Merry Christmas

Pic of the day

He's a gay man now

You may recognise Catherine Tate (Donna Noble on Doctor Who) and Colin Morgan (Merlin on Merlin. This is from Catherine's 2007 Christmas show, but Mrs. Murphy and her family were characters that appeared several timse during the run of her series.

I find Catherine's accent overdone, but there is a ring of authenticity, remembering that Belfast accents can be area specific. In this case it's a working class Catholic housing estate. My Irish relatives maintain they can usually tell roughly where in Belfast someone comes from just by listening to his speech.

Probably NSFW

The holly and no ivy

My inexpensive solution to Christmas decoration. Mug from the dollar store, holly from the bush outside, and candy canes. The wrapping on the candy canes isn't noticeable in regular lighting.

Is it too early?

I just switched my iPod to my Christmas playlist - just a sample above - 18 hours of music and who knows how many repeats. I'll probably be sick of them by next week, but I'm in the spirit (not the spirits, that comes later) today.

Yes, I see Mantovani on there. Not sure I can stand that many strings.

Christmas baking - round 1

Rum Butter Tarts & Chocolate Chip Cookies

Shortbread

Christmas trimings or toys to be?

Only a couple of weeks to Christmas, so having finished my first batch of baking on Saturday, I started some decorating yesterday. I'm not sure how much I'm going to do, but no tree. Last year the cats had it on the floor more often than it was standing up - or so it seemed. I only have the one spot where it needs to sit on a table in the window and it has to be small, just the right size to become a challenging toy. It will be interesting to see if the mantle remains intact or if I find bits and pieces some time in July.

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Bits & Bites

• In an unusual move, Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of Canada, becomes the Governor of the Bank of England. He is the first foreign national to hold the post.

• It's status quo after the federal by-elections. The Conservatives retain 2 seats and the NDP 1. House standings remain: Conservative - 165, NDP - 101, Liberal - 35, Bloc Québecois - 4, Green - 1, Independent - 2.

• Rob Ford the Mayor of Toronto, Canada's largest city, is ousted for conflict of interest. But he's not going without a fight or without blaming "a left-wing conspiracy." Rob, Rob, Rob. You used city property for your own purposes and then, after the Integrity Commissioner called you on it, participated in the Council discussion and vote that determined you didn't have to pay from your own pocket. And your excuse was you hadn't read the conflict of interest guidelines. Conspiracy has nothing to do with it. You screwed yourself.

• Finally, to "un-Grinch" Christmas, $2 million of toys and goods stolen from the Salvation Army have been recovered.